below please find a selection of the latest news from the world of pulp and paper.

For the first time there will be a total European winner of the packaging design competition PIDA. On 30 September the four finalists from Sweden, the UK, Germany and France will compete for the title Grand Finale winner of PIDA 2019. The festive award ceremony will be held at 15.00 at the BillerudKorsnäs exhibition stand at the “world’s leading trade show for creative luxury packaging” – Luxe Pack Monaco.

Metsä Group is kicking off apprenticeship training in its production units across Finland once again. The company is looking for some 50 people with vocational training, who will gain a qualification for versatile and responsible production tasks at Metsä Group’s mills during their 18-month apprenticeship. The training is set to begin in January 2020.

Advanced technology is an integral part of society, with electronic and digital devices becoming ubiquitous. To ensure the integrity of devices ranging from personal electronics, including computers and cell phones, to industrial automation solutions, it is critical that these moisture-sensitive components such as printed circuit boards (PCBs) and surface mount devices (SMDs) are carefully transported and stored. SMDs for instance, are comprised of many powerful and essential processors, chipsets, diodes, transistors and integrated circuits that power today’s digital devices and products. These components are very sensitive and can easily fail when exposed to moisture, due to cracking, delamination and “popcorning”.

To be close to the market and to anticipate customers’ needs: this is what Sappi, manufacturer of innovative sublimation, printing and speciality papers, is known for. At this year’s Printing United tradeshow in Dallas, Texas (USA), Sappi is going to present its new Transjet Drive dye sublimation paper at booth 5123 from 23 to 25 October as well as different papers for large format inkjet printing. In addition, Sappi’s Ultracast casting and release papers will be shown. These products deliver superior textures with 100% replication for a wide range of aesthetic and functional applications.

Increasing production capacity by over 90 percent and switching to more economic raw materials while increasing cleanliness of the end products – these were the two goals of the Serbian paper manufacturer Umka d.o.o. when upgrading its cardboard machine BM1. Part of the project was thereby an upgrade of the stock preparation with an InjectaCell Compact flotation unit and InfiltraDiscfilter disc filter from Voith’s BlueLine portfolio. Due to the excellent performance of the new products, the company has laid the groundwork to achieve these goals.

The Marutomi Group started up a Modulo-Plus ES tissue machine supplied by Toscotec at its Marutomi Paper’s mill in Fuji city, Shizuoka, Japan. This is the first of two tissue lines ordered by the Japanese producer. The second line is scheduled for start-up in 2020 at Ono Paper’s mill.

Valmet will supply a board machine with an extensive automation and Industrial Internet package for JK Paper Limited’s Fort Songadh Mill in India. By investing in the latest coated board technology, JK Paper targets to increase its market share on a growing Indian market and to serve the market with more local supply. The start-up of the machine is scheduled for the end of 2020.

UPM plans to permanently close a SC paper machine in Rauma, Finland and sell its Chapelle newsprint mill in Grand-Couronne, France. If realized, the measures would result in a reduction of 265,000 tonnes of SC capacity and 240,000 tonnes of newsprint capacity in UPM’s portfolio.

Grupo Gondi has ordered Voith’s OnCare.Asset workforce management software for its new PM 7 paper machine, which is currently being built in its paper packaging mill in Guadalupe, Nuevo León, Mexico.

Stora Enso will be the presenting sponsor for FIS Nordic World Ski Championships 2021 in Oberstdorf, Germany. The sponsorship builds on the experiences from previous ski championships to contribute to the sustainability and circularity of a large-scale sports event. The company will showcase its renewable and recyclable solutions in numerous applications.

The benefits of wood construction include the material’s lightness and fast construction. The most relevant aspect where climate change is concerned, however, is the unique ability of wood structures to store carbon in themselves for their entire life-cycle. For example, an average Finnish single-family house built from wood stores roughly 30 tonnes of atmospheric carbon dioxide within its wooden structures. This is equal to the carbon dioxide emissions generated by the average miles driven by one person over a period of 10 years.

Valmet has launched a new Valmet Optical Consistency Measurement (Valmet OC2R), which has been developed for recycled pulp manufacturing applications, as well as general stock preparation applications in paper, tissue, and board.

BillerudKorsnäs invests in the area of recycling as it acquires a minority holding in the innovative company Recycl3R. The company has developed a digital solution to increase recycling rates of single use packaging - a product that can be used globally. The investment is made by BillerudKorsnäs’ wholly owned subsidiary BillerudKorsnäs Venture AB, which invests in young and innovative companies with solutions that will influence the future for packaging.

Voith expands its portfolio in the forming section with the DuoFormer CBh – a cost- and space-efficient shoe-blade gap former solution for the fabrication of packaging papers at high production rates, providing paper producers with the utmost flexibility and a fast return on investment.

Valmet invests in a new pilot facility at its Fiber Technology Center in Sundsvall to strengthen the company’s research and development capabilities related to bioenergy, biofuels and biochemicals. The new pilot facility will start up in October 2020.

Valmet has progressed well with its Sustainability360° agenda emphasizing continuous improvement of sustainable business practices. As one proof of the good progress, Valmet has been included in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI) already for the sixth consecutive year. The company was listed both in the Dow Jones Sustainability World and Europe indices. The total number of companies included this year in the DJSI World for 2019-2020 is 318. The comprehensive ranking evaluates companies’ economic, environmental and social performance.

The second World BioEconomy Forum held in the Finnish resort town of Ruka ended today with eight declarations agreed upon by delegates from across the globe. The three-day event kicked off with a update on the latest European Bioeconomy Strategy and action plan launched last year from Elisabetta Balzi, head of the Bioeconomy Unit at the European Commission. The latest strategy, with funds of Euro 10 billion for research into food and natural resources for the years 2021-27, is now in full swing in its implementation and Balzi gave a comprehensive, detailed presentation of where resources are being allocated.